Fallowfield – where the past cannot rest
Fallowfield Hall: once an avant garde art college, now abandoned and decaying. To journalist Rowan Woodhouse it is the fabled backdrop to her parents’ 1970s love story. But is there more to Fallowfield – and her family – than she’s been told?
Struggling with the loss of her artist father, Rowan hopes a research project to celebrate the half-centenary of the college where he taught will lessen her grief, reveal more about his life and work, and bring a deeper understanding of her enigmatic mother who died tragically young.
#Fallowfield X/Twitter@BBookCollective #RandomThingsTours @annecater @RandomTTours Instagram @breakthrough_book_collective @randomthingstours #bookstagram #blogtour
But Rowan soon discovers that Fallowfield wasn’t all about hedonistic student life and idyllic picnics on its famous daffodil lawns. Jealousies, betrayals and rivalries emerge when she learns of the mysterious death of one young woman and the unsolved disappearance of another.
As past and present become dangerously intertwined, how will Rowan cope with the suspicions sparked by her investigations and will these impact her own troubled personal life?
My Review
Fallowfield is set partly in the 2000s and partly in the 1970s. The latter was my era. I went to The London College of Fashion in 1973. It was amazing. I didn’t drink though or use cocaine (I’m not sure I’d even heard of it back then). We had very little money and lived in a hostel. We must have been very boring compared to Rowan’s father Nick and his friends.
Nick was a student at Fallowfield before returning the following year as a lecturer. Her mother Annie was a student when he was teaching – their relationship forbidden by the college. They still managed to see each other on the quiet.
We are introduced to other students, and to hippie Zizi, staying on a campsite nearby. Everything seems to revolve around Zizi, who died on the night of the summer ball.
It’s all too much for Rowan, who is determined to find out the truth following her father’s death, and why he might be linked to Zizi. But everyone is telling her a different story and they all seem to be lying.
I can’t believe how naive Rowan is, especially as she is a features writer for a magazine. She is so shocked that her father might have been up to all sorts in the 70s, including drinking, taking drugs and two-timing Annie. Even having previous relationships seems to bother her. She is currently seeing photographer Doug who also works for the magazine. We know they are wrong for each other even before Rowan does.
Fallowfield must have taken hours of research – I don’t think I could ever have the patience. It’s so well-written and on-point, and I learnt a lot about a genre I have never heard of called Good Girl Art, a type of artwork depicting women on the covers of comic books, detective novels and pulp magazines. Look it up! I found it fascinating.
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
About the Author
Nicole Swengley is a highly-regarded and experienced journalist who has written about art and design for titles such as The Times, Financial Times, Daily Telegraph, London Evening Standard, Wall Street Journal and many others.
A past student of the Faber Academy, Nicole has written non-fiction books for Collins and Adlard Coles and has had several short stories published in magazines and anthologies.
Her debut novel, The Portrait Girl, was published by Breakthrough Books in 2024.
Fallowfield is her second full-length work of fiction.
Publisher’s note:
This book’s appeal will be wide to readers of upmarket women’s, literary, mystery and amateur-sleuth fiction but in particular may appeal to mature audiences (especially anyone who remembers the 1970s! Or those with an interest in that era). Also to anyone with a passion for or keen interest in art – of all kinds (including a 1950s glamour-girl genre more akin to Hollywood posters, which is key to the story. The male gaze does not go unquestioned but the book and its heroine also take a quite pragmatic view). The book also takes place in some rarified worlds, such as those of art collectors and galleries, although it has a diverse cast of characters from all backgrounds. Fallowfield may also appeal to fans of ‘dark academia’. The book has moderate levels of threat.
